A commute to remember: Man who saved men from burning home was the only passerby who stopped (with file video)

Fire Departments from Milton, Greenfield, Rock City Falls work on a structure fire on Route 29 mid-afternoon on Monday. The residents of the home were safely evacuated.Photo Erica Miller 4/30/12 news_Fire1_Tues

Fire Departments from Milton, Greenfield, Rock City Falls work on a structure fire on Route 29 mid-afternoon on Monday. The residents of the home were safely evacuated.Photo Erica Miller 4/30/12 news_Fire5_Tues

MILTON -- Pat Rogers can't recall how many times he's driven past the house at 537 Route 29 on his way home from work, but he knows his commute won't be the same after last Monday.

The 51-year-old contractor had just left his job at Quad/Graphics Monday afternoon and was headed back to Broadalbin when he rounded a bend on Route 29 and spotted a bright orange glow through the trees.

"Something don't look right here," he thought, slowing his car to a crawl to glance back over his shoulder. That's when he saw flames coming from the front porch of 537 Route 29 and four cars parked outside -- their drivers nowhere in sight.

They had to still be inside the home, he thought, cutting the wheel to hang a right into the driveway. Indeed they were, he'd shortly discover, and Rogers' quick thinking likely helped the men escape without serious injury.

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The fire started around 3 p.m. Monday, Saratoga County Fire Coordinator Ed Tremblay said Wednesday, when one of the home's five tenants didn't properly extinguish his cigarette before leaving the home. The man's four housemates, all Navy men who work night shifts at the Kenneth A. Kesselring site in West Milton, were asleep inside.

Rogers leaned on the horn of his Ford F-150 for what he figured was probably 20 seconds, scanning the house's windows for signs of movement. He didn't see any.

"You gotta be kidding me," he remembered saying to himself as he recalled the afternoon Wednesday. He jumped out of his truck and ran to the home's back door. It was unlocked. He went inside.

"Is anybody in the house?" he shouted. Nothing. He asked again, this time louder. Finally, one of the sailors peeked around the corner in shorts and a T-shirt, half-asleep and entirely confused.

"You gotta get out of here," Rogers told the young man. "Your house is on fire." The tenant turned around to see black smoke and flames coming from his front porch, quickly spreading to other portions of his home. "Oh no," Rogers recalled him saying.

It doesn't take much for homes to go up, Tremblay said, particularly older ones. The roof on the porch contained the flames to the walls, he said, and it took off from there.

Rogers helped get two others out of the home and the four of them waited by the garage. It couldn't have been more than five minutes from when he first saw small flames on the porch. By then, the home was halfway engulfed in flames.

He had driven past this home every day for years, he said. He always saw military people going in. He asked the three roommates if there was anyone still inside.

That's when they noticed the fourth roommate in a second-story window, smoke and flames spreading toward him. Emergency crews had yet to arrive.

"His only way out was that window," Rogers said of the stranger. He shouted to him to grab the windowsill and lower himself as far as possible. Rogers said he and the other three roommates caught him.

At some point during this ordeal, Rogers dialed 911. As the four roommates stood in stunned silence, watching their home burn, he got back on the phone with emergency dispatchers.

By the time Rock City Falls fire officials arrived on scene, no more than 10 minutes after Rogers stopped at the house, Rogers was gone.

Traffic continued to drive past the home throughout the fire; Rogers didn't count how many cars drove past.